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Copy 1 



lit PUBLIC PLAYGROUND 



An Interesting Development in 
Education 




"Batter up!" at Chico Normal Training School. 



-/-&_€^ 



Issued by EDWARD HYATT 



Superintendent Public Instruction 



<* 



V V 



This is the third of a series of leaflets on Health Conservation authorized by the 
legislature of ign at the request of the Women's Christian Temperance Union of the 
State of California, tinder the auspices of Mrs. Sara J. Dorr, the president, and Miss 
Anna E. Chase, the secretary. It is, therefore, appreciatively inscribed to the good 
women of that organisation, those ziho never weary in n'ell doing, and who make such 
a powerful influence for good in every corner of our commonwealth. 



ft 9f C< 

JAN 31 



i3io» 






INTRODUCTORY. 



This circular is to call the particular attention of the people of California to a 
great social movement that has spread over our whole country almost in a day, so 
quickly that we hardly realize it. or understand it — the Playground Movement. 

Thi> country is so strong, so young, so full of lusty strength, that it has not had 
as yet much thought oi the future It has never stopped to worry about the kind 
of human beings who arc coming on. It has been so eager in developing its 
resource-, so swift in its pursuit of dollars, so engrossed in spending money, that 
little thought has been given to preserving the sane and wholesome human life that 
is necessary to the real prosperity of any land. 

Opportunity for relaxation and play are necessary, just as food and drink are 
necessary. Without them, man is a morose, dissatisfied and dangerous demon. 
Those who own the country now and run it now must give thought and time and 
money to the play of the young people who are coming on. They withhold it at 
their peril and at the peril of the land. 

We are herding incredible numbers of artisans and laborers into congested cities. 
with no opportunity for relaxation and exercise in the open air. 

We have been building huge schoolhouses on the crowded streets, and filling 
them full of thousands upon thousands of children without opportunity at home or 
at school for natural play in the sunshine and the open air. 

We drive the little boys and their games of ball away from the vacant lots in 
order to cover the lots with buildings — and give the boys nothing instead. We 
make grand parks and till them with flowers and grass and shrubs — not for the 
poor people and the children to use, but for the rich people in good cloth 
admire and point to with pride. 

We give our school grounds to the janitor rather than to the children. The 
youngsters arc penalized if they come early or stay late. The school hours are 
arranged for the convenience of the teachers rather than for the good of the chil- 
dren. The whole school plant is used less than half of the time. 

All these things and many others of similar import constitute a peril to our 
nation that good citizen- must face. The Playground Movement is directed againsl 
it. Therefore, 1 venture to send this little message to the good people of the (".olden 
asking them to read it and think about it. 

truly yours, 

Edward I [yatt, 

Superintendent Public Instruction. 



A MODERN PLAYGROUND. 




General view of the Echo Park Playground at Los Angeles, one of the largest and most 
modern in the country. This shows a characteristic setting and characterist:: activities. 




The ^reat American game as it is played at Echo Park. Lungs and arms and legs are 
given the work intended for them, and necessary for health. Note the wide spaces afforded 
by this playground. Some such opportunity is necessary to the safety of the state wherever 
there are congested populations. 



THE PUBLIC PLAYGROUND 

An Interesting Development in Education 



Prepared by 
FREDERICK B. MOORE 



WHY PLAYGROUNDS? 

Play is the natural activity of childhood. It is through play that the teacher 
enters into intimate touch with the child and secures an actual personal influence 
over him. Children get their real life largely through play and derive from it their 
interest-, on which education must always largely depend. 

Yet. it is only within the last dozen years that Americans have begun to realize 
the importance of play and to meet this need, that is greater and deeper and more 
vital than any need for books and study. 

The America of our grandfathers was essentially rural. In the latter third of the 
nineteenth century, however, new economic and industrial conditions gave rise to a 
great tide of humanity sweeping city-ward from the fields and villages. Cities grew 
at a rate truly marvelous. The native population became urban in many great 
sections of the land. The people were drawn into the cities. Born of a race of 
pioneers, adapted by heredity and inclination to the free, open, vigorous life of the 
farm and woodland, the children bore the brunt of the change. They were the 
one- wlii> suffered most. They were crammed into tenements and flats; herded 
into schools without room for active play: pressed harder and harder by more 
exacting teachers; forced to seek recreation in the canyon-like streets, in foul air 
and moral contamination. They were restricted more and more closely by ever- 
increasing laws and ordinances. They were given a strange environment that took 
the pink from their cheeks and the steel from their natures. Through them the 
.■.a- degenerating. The new generation, the citizens of the future, were for- 
n. Now, recognition for their welfare is coming, and the cities generally are 
beginning to value and conserve the strength, vitality and sanity of their men and 
women of to-morrow, even while they are paying in sickness, and crime, and vice, 
and anarchy the price of past negl< 

The movement has spread throughout the land. From a recognition of the play 
need has grown a realization of the benefit- of - rganised play. This, linked with a 
movement to make the school the civic and social center of each community, has 
extended the scope of the Playground Movemenl even to the rural districts. It has 
a mess very community in the land. 




This is an interesting view of the yard of the Fri 
Miss Sarah B. Jenkins, principal. It shows a play 
: '.-. t ;:.-.::. i ; r a r : : ; i z = r. : s = r. f the 2 h.: ! : 5 :: the r. e: 
use for the small city school yard, and is an excel 
interest of the children themselves in their school 
spirit, and for making of the schoolhouse ir. 

Note the basketball equipment shown, and 



:;:ze Stairs 



-.cisco. 
le children of 
["his is a new 
. — nlating the 

—.unity 
community it 



II. 

HISTORY AND IDEALS. 

Historically, the Playground Movement in this country began in Boston in 
but concerned itself then only in a limited way with the needs of small children, 
For a dozen years thereafter the movement lay dormant, until in 1898, the begin- 
nings of the world-famous Chicago system were made. Upon this, especially the 
big recreation center system o\ Smith Park, have been modeled a very large number 
o\ the public playgrounds all over the United States. The growth was slow, even 
after the beginning was made. In 1906, but forty-one communities in the United 
States had supervised playgrounds. There were but eight playground associations 
and no State playground legislaiton. Ninety cities maintained playgrounds in 1907, 
one hundred and seventy-seven in 1908 and three hundred and thirty-six in 1909. 
During 1910. a hundred and ninety-live more cities began playground campaigns. 
and the mownu-nt is now general throughout the United States. Xew Jersey-, 
Massachusetts, Virginia. Ohio. Washington and California led in enacting play- 
ground legislation, and others have followed till now sixteen States have such laws. 
In the last decade, municipalities in this country have expended considerably over 
0,000 on playgrounds alone. 

IDEALS ARE SOCIAL. 

The ideals of the movement have been primarily social from the first. In the 
very beginning, they were negative — to keep the children away from the physical, 
social and moral dangers of the street. With its growth the movement has taken 
up a series of positive social and economic aims. The forms of activity are quite 
varied, including besides ordinary games, play and swimming, such things as 
dramatics, motion pictures, gardening, civic clubs, folk dancing, industrial work, 
libraries, -elf-government clubs, singing, story telling, play festivals. 

Thinking people realize that through the recreation center workers are made 
more efficient, so that factory and other industrial labor will be better done because 
the operatives will be better fitted for their tasks. They realize that scientific study 
of juvenile delinquency has shown that recreation centers are powerful agents in 
reducing juvenile crime. They realize there is no more effective way than this of 
lighting tuberculosis. They appreciate the benefits of the development of com- 
munity spirit through festivals and other public gatherings of a local nature. Those 
interested in the assimilation of the immigrants coming to this country recognize 
in the play- rounds the real melting pot of the nation. In playgrounds are found a 
-ful weapon for lighting the white slave traffic. At the playground i- devel- 
oped in the child the civic sense; he learns to live with and get along with other 
children, and thereby acquire- the fundamental training of citizenship. 

Money expended on playgrounds i< not lost. They meet a typically modern 
requirement, in that they are good business. They are worth, to the community, in 
increased efficiency of its citizenry, and decrease in crime and vice, the cosl of put- 
tin- them ill and maintaining them. Their preventive effects have already been 
amply demonstrated. 

IDENT1I II I) W II M SCHOOLS. 

Recently has grown up a disposition to link the playgrounds more closely with 
tin- schools. It i< parallel with a movement that is making of the schoolhouse the 



civic and recreational center of the community. Less and less are playgrounds the 
work of private organizations and endowments, and more and more are cities and 
towns putting the public moneys into the work of caring for the play needs of the 
children and the children's parents. 

Dr. Luther H. Gulick declared after three years of investigation that sixteen 
per cent of the children who drop out of school while in the grammar grades do so 
because of ill health and relievable physical deficiency. He declares such children 
progress nine per cent more slowly than healthy, normal children in their school 
work. The work of the playground would seem to be more important to these 
children than the work of the schoolroom itself. 

But over and above this is the direct educational value of play itself. The game 
has a benefit for the mind and the spirit as well as for the body, and so has its 
important function to perform for the most robust child, just as truly as for 
the sickly. 




A period of unmixed joy at a municipal summer camp, on the beach, Los Angeles county, 
California. Barefoot American boyhood is not only being fed at nominal cost, here, but is 
learning the fundamental lessons of citizenship, in this democratic contact with his fellows. 



III. 

THE MOVEMENT IN CALIFORNIA. 

California, in company with other Stales of the Pacific coast, has done much 
toward adequate playground provision; very much more remains to be accom- 
plished in the future. 

The roster ^\ cities thai have made serious efforts along this line is considerable 
San Francisco has spent well over a million dollars in developing a system of seven 
playgrounds. Oakland began in 1909 with two small school playgrounds, and now 
has ten good centers, five in parks and five in school yards. Los Angeles had the 
first municipal playground commission in the United States, and up to January 
1st, 1911, had expended $137,000 for the work. The commission has supervision 
of thirteen play centers, in addition to a site of fifty-three acres secured this year, 
which is to he made one of the most complete recreation grounds in any city in the 
United State-. Berkeley, Sacramento, Stockton, Chico, Marysville, Riverside, 
Redlands, Pasadena, San Diego, Eureka, Fresno. Yuba City. Watsonville, and 
Santa Monica are among the other cities of the State that have been active along 
this line. Seashore and mountain camps are becoming popular, extending the 
field of activity to rural districts. 

It has come, moreover, to he recognized that the need for supervised playgrounds 
is not confined to the larger cities, but extends to the smaller city and even to the 
rural community. 

EDUCATING LEADERS. 

A crying need in playground work is for the efficient and trained supervisor and 
leader, who must he a combination of the athlete and social worker. Directed or 
supervised play is necessary. 

To meet this need for competent play leaders, normal schools and universities 
are putting in courses that are more and more nearly touching the practical want. 
While only about half the normals on the Pacific coast have done so, four of the 
California state normal schools have equipped model playgrounds and arc training 
pupil- for the work. 

Recognition of the need is being given by the universities of the coast. The 
University of California, following up the great success of a course in plays and 
game-, given at the 1911 summer school session, has greatly enlarged the course 
and the number of instructor-. 

However, the need for trained leaders has so far outsripped the supply that three 
cities of the coast, i. <-., Seattle, Portland, and Los Angeles, have put in training 
schools of their own and are operating them successfully. 

PL \N \s I Dl C \TION. 

A committee of the California Teachers* Association, in a report submitted early 
this year, said: "One of the significant developments of the movement i> the 
awakening of educators to the importance and significance of play in the educa- 
tional development of the child. In Alameda, the Board of Education by order 
made plays and games a regular part of the school activities, and required certain 
of the teachers to actively take part with tin- children in their plays and games. 
This ha- been attended with wonderful results. School architecture is also taking 



on marked changes to meet the growing idea of the schoolhouse as a community 
civic, social and recreation center." 

After a summary of educational work along playground lines on the Pacific coast 
and particularly in California, the report continues : 

"The private association is rapidly passing out of existence as an active force 
in this development. The municipal commission idea is growing stronger and 
stronger and is rapidly developing into the larger idea of the Public Recreation 
Commission. The most remarkable feature of the whole development of the past 
three years, however, has been the sudden awakening of the school systems of the 
various cities and towns and even of the rural districts of the State. There are 
several reasons for this and the prospect is that the school system is likely to be 
the dominant factor in the playground development of the future in all except the 
very largest cities, and even in these, the backbone of a system of municipal play- 
grounds will be the school playgrounds. With the rapid development of the school- 
house as the social, civic, recreative center of the people, the importance of the 
schoolhouse as a factor in the playground and public recreation scheme of a city or 
town or a country district takes on still greater significance. 

"Aside from the social possibilities of the school playground and the school build- 
ing, to educators the educational power of organized play and games in relation to 
physical growth, mental development and character building is too potent a force 
to be longer neglected as a vital part of the scheme of public instruction." 

NEEDS IN CALIFORNIA. 

Needs of the playground movement in its relation to the schools of California 
are outlined in the report as follows : 

1. A better understanding on the part of school workers and of patrons of the 
movement, and of the significance of the movement as an educational power and as 
a great constructive social force. 

2. Teachers prepared to act as leaders in plays and games with the children. 

3. Professional leaders in play and recreation, for the cities. 

4. Larger area for school grounds. "Many schoolhouses are now being erected 
upon plats of ground entirely inadequate." 

5. Careful collection and study of data relative to the development in all its 
phases. "It has been eight years since the first playground commission was estab- 
lished by a municipality in this State. Within that time, the movement has spread 
with remarkable rapidity and has taken many different forms. Within that time 
has developed the large idea of Public Recreation, involving the question of proper 
opportunities for the right use of leisure, not only of the children, but of all the 
people. The schools are looming large in this new idea, but certainly no one is 
prepared to state with surety just what form of organization can handle this new 
form of public activity. All of the facts need to be collected and studied." 

To meet the need for more school play space, playground people of California 
are planning to bring before the legislature a bill fixing the minimum size of school 
grounds at 100 square feet per pupil. 



IV. 

WHAT IS A PLAYGROUND? 

A playground is a place to play. But, it must be more than that, else the chil- 
dren will not be attracted ami will not come; and it does nol secure the desired 
results. A playground should have apparatus and equipment, yet even such a play- 
ground doe- nol secure large attendance of children and may become a public 
nuisance. A third factor — supervision — is an essential. In fact, the three, --pace. 
equipment, and supervision, are necessary to the playground in its perfection; the 
first and the last are essentials. 

The need for more space is easily recognized. The school playground, the street 
and prim parks with inviolable grass have been too often the only play places for 
the children oi cities and towns. In most places school playgrounds have been 
entirely unsuitable in size. Only the simplest games or no games at all could be 
played. Advanced educational thought is now heartily for roomy school grounds 
everywhere; a standard has been fixed at thirty square feet, at the very least, for 
each pupil. The size of municipal playgrounds can be determined by no such 
standard, of course, but a committee of the Playground and Recreation Association 
of America, in a recent report, set two acres as the minimum. 

CHOOSING THE EQUIPMENT. 

The proper equipment and organization of a playground is a technical matter 
that will naturally he shaped by the leader or director in charge of the work. 
There are numerous experts now at work in the State, who may be appealed to for 
advice or assistance, such for instance as C. B. Raitt, director of the Los Angeles 
city playgrounds ; Bessie L. Stoddart, president of the Los Angeles Playground 
Commission; L. H. Weir, held secretary of the Playground and Recreation Asso- 
ciation of America, with Pacific coast offices at 1058 Phelan Building, San Francisco, 
Cal. : Max L. Stone, director of the Q-street playground in Sacramento, and 
others. 

The following pieces of apparatus are almost universally used and may be 
regarded as -tandard equipment at present: 

The sand bin. for the little tots. It consists of a sheltered and protected space 
enclosed like a flower bed and tilled with clean sand. Many fascinating activities 
center about it. 

The slide, for the next size of children. Its great advantage is that it can be 
used continuously by any number of children. Many of the besl pieces of apparatus 
for individual use are practically worthless for the playground, because they can not 
d by large numbers at the same time. The slide furnishes exhilarating exer- 
cise in rapid succession and i^ perhaps the most popular feature of the playground. 

The horizontal bar. for boys of all ages and conditions is probably the most use- 
ful apparatus of all. It should be adjustable in height and should be underlain by 
a bed ■•»' sawdust <>r other elastic material to avoid accidents. 

The -wing i- probably the most common piece <>f apparatus in the play of small 
children everywhere. It is also one of the mosl dangerous, and. a- generally made, 
one of the most unsightly. The swing frame should be of steel gaspipe, 3 inches 
in diameter if threaded or 2 : . inches if made with solid joints. The whole should 
be well braced and sel in concrete about 3j4 or 4 feel deep. The swings for a 



school yard should not be over 8 or 10 feet high. The tall swing takes up too much 
room, is preempted by the larger children, and is too dangerous. The swings should 
be placed in the most retired corner of the yard and parallel with the fence, where 
the other children will not be struck. People are apt to fear that the children will 
be hurt by falling out of the swing. This rarely happens. The real danger is to 
the child who is running by. If two children are standing up in a swing and swing- 
ing hard and another child runs by and is struck in the side of the head, he will 
certainly be seriously injured and may be killed. In some places the swings are 
fenced off. so as to prevent this. A piece of rubber hose is sometimes nailed to the 
side of the swing board, so as to deaden the blow if a child is struck. For the 
school yard it is best to have as light a swing as possible, because its momentum is 
not so great in that case, and it is easier to put out and take in. A wooden board 
and ropes are to be preferred to an iron seat and chains or links. 

Seesaws, ladders, parallel bars., wooden horses, swinging rings, giant strides and 
other things of the kind can be added to the apparatus when room and funds 
permit. 




Gardening is one of the most pleasant and helpful activities 
of the playground. 



There should always be generous provision for active games and room reserved 
for gang plays in every decent playground. The lively sports, requiring running, 
jumping, striking, throwing, all under the exhilaration of the contest and out in the 
open air, are much more beneficial in every way than the cold and artificial exer- 
cises of the gymnasium, much better than anything carried on by means of formal 
apparatus. The real function of the playground is to furnish opportunity for the 
natural sports and games of American youth. It is absurd in California, the land 
of sunshine and outdoor life, to have indoor gymnasiums, or to shut away the free 
air of heaven from any of our forms of bodily exercise. 

Every effort should be made to provide a ball ground, not only for boys, but for 
girls. Tennis and basketball are splendid. Volley ball, indoor baseball, tether ball. 



1': 



— 8 — 

arc excellent expedients for restricted space. Running tracks and jumping pits 
may be provided. Swimming and wading pools add to the zest and inter 

When the playground merges into the community recreation center, the scope of 
equipment becomes truly vast, and almost as varied as the public life of the people. 

USE OF THE SCHOOL YARD.* 

"In a number of school systems oi my acquaintance," says Henry S. Curtis, in a 
recent bulletin of the United States Bureau of Education, "the school yard is used 
not more than half an hour to an hour a day. The children are sent home at noon. 
They are not allowed to come in the morning until just before school, and they are 
required to go home as soon as school is out. The thought has been apparently to 
use the school grounds as little as possible. We are getting a new conception of 
what is desirable, however, and the whole tendency is toward wider use. I am 
lally inclined to think that the next ten years will see the use of all suitable 
school yards quadrupled. This is coming through the rapid extension of the sum- 
mer playground, through its supervision after school and on Saturdays for the 
same purpose, and in its continuous use throughout the day for the play of 
different classes. 1 expect the next great extension of its use to be as a playground 
at night for the adults and working boys and girls of the community. If the play- 
ground is properly lighted, it is possible to make it a delightful place for such games 
as volley ball, basket ball, tether ball, and even indoor baseball in the evening. If 
the school furnishes a swimming pool, this will give very nearly the same physical 
facilities that the Young Men's Christian Association and the Young Women's 
Christian Association otter. 

"For the small child the paramount question is not arithmetic or geography, but 
physical health. For the six-year-old, two hours in the classroom is probably 
enough, lie ought to have two or three periods in the playground every day. 
This time may well grow less from year to year until it gets down to perhaps three 
periods a week. The child needs at least three periods for physical training. 
Three periods are required in the common schools of Germany, and when we con- 
sider that games mean not only physical training, but social and moral training as 
well, no thoughtful person can well think three periods too much. These play 
period- should be so arranged that in the larger schools there would be two or 
three classes in the yard all the time. The regular teachers should play with the 
children, but there should be a special playground teacher in charge. In the upper 
classes four baseball and four volley ball teams might well be formed in each class. 
The girls play both of these games as well or nearly as well as the boys, and every 
child should be required to play. This will give a good period of physical training 
in the open air. and the volley ball will be one of the besl possible exercises for 
correcting the stooped and rounded shoulders and the flat chests of the classroom." 

LEADER Ml IMPORTANT. 

Important as are the physical assets of the playground, the personal element 

shadows all else. The personality of the play leader i», at bottom, the one 

■its vitally. Mi— Bessie I,. Stoddart, president of the Los Angeles 

round Commission, summing up her wide experience, declared recently: "I 



• Any one interested in this matter should by all means send to the United States 
Bureau of Education at Washington. D. C. for a copy of Bulletin No. 16. "The 
Reorganized Playground." 

II 



would say that the success of a playground rests ninety per cent upon the character 
and ability of the one in charge, letting ten per cent represent the equipment." 

The power for good that the right kind of a play leader may exert is really vast. 
The physical ends to be obtained through the playground may be summed up as 
strength, energy and happiness in the children. The scope of the social ends that 
may be effectively reached is as wide as life itself. 

Cleanliness is of prime importance. Provision for washing should always be 
made, personal talks given children who are dirty, and recognition to the children 
who are neat. Politeness can be taught by example and by encouraging its prac- 
tice to the leader and to the other children during play, when it is most apt to be 
neglected. Formation of friendships ; obedience to the rules of the games ; loyalty 
to the team; but not unreasoning partisanship; justice in the enforcement of the 
"square deal"; honesty; truthfulness; courage and determination — all these and 
others of the qualities needful for the make-up of real men and women can and 
should be cultivated on the playground even more effectively than in the school. 

The director should be a companion; should know as many of the children as 
possible by name, and be their friend, sympathetic and interested in their experi- 
ences and plans, willing to help in all their right endeavors. If he possesses any 
prowess or skill, it will increase the effectiveness of his example in everything; 
and, conversely, ignorance of rules or inability to take part effectively in any play- 
ground activity will decrease his influence in everything. 

Thus, a prime need of the movement to-day is for trained leaders, thoroughly 
equipped in a technical way and by nature fitted for the social side of the work. 
There is necessity for capable men and women to mold best results from the 
materials put in their hands, by this swift and sure campaign for the uplift of 
humanity. 

The children must play. Give them the opportunity to do it well. To withhold 
it is dangerous to the State. 




12 



A HIGH SCHOOL SWIMMING POOL 

How Lnterprise Improved Life for One 
Community 




Escondido High School swimming pool, built through the enterprise of principal and pupils, 
being used by the girls of the school. 

We usually think of a swimming pool as a theoretical affair, very far away 
from the public school. Yet, here is a picture of a pool that is in operation to-day 
at the Escondido High School, in San Diego County. The girls are taking a 
swim, in charge of their teacher. 

The po. .1 i> tin- result of an idea conceived by John 11. Crippen, then principal 
of the school, when he one day accompanied the boys of the school to a makeshift 
"swimming hole" in the river, where they were accustomed to congregate. Mr. 
Crippen got the boys and girls interested in the idea of the swimming pool, so 
that they donated about SUM), and themselves did the work of excavation during 
and on Saturdays. The trustees of the school gave about $300, and 
one of them secured a donation of ,^1( in water Stock. 

The pool ha. been a greal success in every sense. The children helped in 
making rule-, which they afterward enforced, such as a provision for shower baths 
before using the plunge, and careful safety regulations. 

The pool was built practically without capital, in decomposed granite -oil. on 
top of a hill, and in a region where water costs money. The water drawn from 
the pool i- used for irrigation, so there- i- no loss. An equal amount of enterprise 
could make the school swimming plunge common in California, instead of a rarity 
among raril 



13 



TAMALPAIS CENTER 

A Country Club for All 
the People 

Imagine a country club for all the people. Picture a spot made the center of the 
recreational life of half a dozen cities and towns., and a wide country neighborhood. 
Think of those communities in time linked by a close bond of civic interests, devel- 
oped through a playground that is set down in the midst of fields., hills and wood- 
land. This may help you to a conception of Tamalpais Center, and its probable 
:::.-. re. 

Twenty-nine acres of beautiful, hill-girt country land in an attractive little valley 
in Marin County are now being used solely for the purposes of recreation The 
land, with a modern concrete building in the California Mission style, and an 
equipment of apparatus and athletic grounds comprise the Tamalpais Center, located 
at Kentfield. Patrons of the place come from all the lower half of Marin County, 
and the holiday crowds it attracts are drawn from the entire Bay region. 

The Center was organized on May Day. 1909, as a result of a :gift of twenty-nine 
acres from Mrs. A. E. Kent wife of the California Congressman. It is controlled 
by a self-perpetuating corporation, but is now leased for a term of two years to a 
club of progressive women, who manage the place. Every department is free to 
the public. A trained woman playground leader has charge and supervision of 
activities. 

These activities comprise lancing, lectures, dramatics, folk dancing, art classes, 
religious study classes, and the athletic and play features. A ballroom, theater, 




he clubhouse. Kentfield. on the occasion of a May Day jest 
the children play on these occasions. The suggestion of life 
te original of the picture. 



and 



:- 



clubrooms. gymnasia indoors and outdoors, athletic field and running track, ball 
courts, baths, and every modern apparatus arc included in the equipment 

The clubhouse is unusually complete. Its floors are large and of the best 
materials; the stage and scenery all that are necessary for a first class, if small, 
theater; the club rooms cozy though roomy, with huge open fireplaces t<> give 
a tine suggestion oi comfort; the dressing rooms completely furnished; the 
kitchen roomy and fitted out with every essential and convenience. The athletic 
fields aie so well suited to their purpose that the\ are used by the schools of the 

COUnty for their principal games and field sports. 

. 1 1 1 > a i s Center is a novel experiment. Very much is expected of its future 
development by men who are most interested in problems of civic improvement. 
Now, it seems to lack a supporting public. But it is believed that with increase of 
population that is bound to come as years go by, the public value of the Center will 
increase immeasurably, and that it will not only become a public property of the 
first importance, but also a notable monument to the public spirit of its donor. 




A typical scene at the Tamalpais Civic Center, Kentfield, showing the apparatus in use 
by bevies of children who have come from far and near. Note the line waiting to use the 
slide, which is probably the most popular and useful piece of equipment in any typical 
playground. 



15 



A SUNDAY SCHOOL PLAYGROUND 

Life = Giving Plan Supplants Traditional 
Graveyard 

Walking along a street in San Francisco one day, I happened to spy a lot of 
children having a grand time playing in a church yard. Over the gate was the 
hospitable and inviting placard shown in the picture. 

Isn't this a contrast to the traditional church yard? Better a place of light and 
life for the children than a burying ground for the dead. 

Tins unique idea originated with Mr. Rolla V. Watt, one of the leading citizens 
of the city, who gives the following brief account of it : 

"Rather than allow this valuable corner to lie idle we decided to institute a 
children's playground for the benefit of the neighborhood in which we were 
situated. You will recall that while this was largely a residential section prior to 
the fire (of 1906), since that time no residences have been reconstructed — board- 
ing houses and apartment houses abound, and such dwelling places do not 
afford any opportunity for the recreation of the children housed therein. This 
playground, therefore, proved to be a boon to that neighborhood, and will 
continue to be in operation until we are in a position to complete our church 
building." (E. H.) 










Novel invitation to enter a city churchyard. 



16 




Second grade "playground ball*' at the Chico Normal Training School. 
"Playground Ball" is an adaDtion of regular baseball suitable for 
small spaces and crowded playgrounds. It is played with a large, 
soft ball and the bases are only half as far apart as in base ball. It 
is a splendid game for boys and girls and should be provided on 
all restricted play spaces. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS %} 

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Friend Wm. Richardson. Superixtexdext of State Prixttxg 
: . aMExto. califorxia 
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